In some ways, I feel like this phenomenon of reference for the sake of reference can be twisted back into a genuine form of comedy again by simply reintroducing the self-awareness. I do not find Hawk Tuah funny, and I do not particularly find any of the downstream divergences from the hawk tuah river funny either. However, I did find it funny when my roommate who is very aware of this then made it a point to do things like walk into my room while I was working on a paper and go “capstone tuah, write on that thang.”
There’s an implicit acknowledgment that truly nothing at all is being said here through our understanding of each other, and because of that the fact that he is truly just doing reference for the sake of reference wraps back around to being funny again — I think on my end, especially so because i know my roommate is certainly not thinking about any of that as he says it.
This is all to say I think there are ways to still find the funny in references, but it works best when the humor is not in the reference but in the subtext. Or maybe I’m just trying to justify laughing at a hawk tuah joke and I’m more sophomoric than I care to imagine.
it was unfair of me to lop hawk tuah in there bc it has reached a postmodern form and I laugh at most hawk tuah jokes now. I don’t think the people laughing at the new wave of sports graphic jokes have enough wit or sense about them to spark a similar breakthuah
In some ways, I feel like this phenomenon of reference for the sake of reference can be twisted back into a genuine form of comedy again by simply reintroducing the self-awareness. I do not find Hawk Tuah funny, and I do not particularly find any of the downstream divergences from the hawk tuah river funny either. However, I did find it funny when my roommate who is very aware of this then made it a point to do things like walk into my room while I was working on a paper and go “capstone tuah, write on that thang.”
There’s an implicit acknowledgment that truly nothing at all is being said here through our understanding of each other, and because of that the fact that he is truly just doing reference for the sake of reference wraps back around to being funny again — I think on my end, especially so because i know my roommate is certainly not thinking about any of that as he says it.
This is all to say I think there are ways to still find the funny in references, but it works best when the humor is not in the reference but in the subtext. Or maybe I’m just trying to justify laughing at a hawk tuah joke and I’m more sophomoric than I care to imagine.
it was unfair of me to lop hawk tuah in there bc it has reached a postmodern form and I laugh at most hawk tuah jokes now. I don’t think the people laughing at the new wave of sports graphic jokes have enough wit or sense about them to spark a similar breakthuah
Been loving the Nothing But Respect appearances lately
Excellent, as always